
DATE: Monday, June 9, 1997                  TAG: 9706070340

SECTION: BUSINESS                PAGE: D1   EDITION: FINAL 

TYPE: SMALL BUSINESS 

SOURCE: BY LON WAGNER, STAFF WRITER 
DATELINE: CHESAPEAKE                        LENGTH:   72 lines

TECNICO CORP: CHESPEAKE: SHIP REPAIR FIRM ROSE FROM ITS INDUSTRY'S ASHES BY STAYING LEAN

If you're looking for ship repair company Tecnico Corp., don't look for the usual telltale signs of a shipyard: piers, cranes, drydocks.

Tecnico doesn't have any of that. It is a self-styled, low-overhead 1990s shipyard that prides itself on being lean and mobile.

Tecnico was founded in 1990 by former Norshipco executive Rafael Torrech III and incorporated the following year. In fact, Torrech's son, Michael, executive vice president, and vice president Mark Oakley also used to work at Norshipco. Torrech's other son, Larry, is also a vice president.

They knew the ups and downs of the shipbuilding business, but that didn't stop them from starting a company in that industry.

``We kind of learned the business from the ground up - that's what we knew,'' Michael Torrech said. ``We knew how to eke out an existence. We were able to get a few contracts and get ourselves in a relative position of strength.''

Tecnico has grown from 30 employees in its first year to about 280 employees. Earlier this year it opened a 17,000-square-foot building in an urban enterprise zone in the South Norfolk section.

The company now has ``a reasonable backlog'' of work that should carry it through the next three to five years, Michael Torrech said.

Tecnico began just as some shipyards were either closing or being forced to lay off workers. Tecnico learned how to work the temporary labor market, tracking which journeymen were the most reliable.

``We started building this business through the harder times,'' Torrech said, ``so we have approached it very frugally and grown it steadily, stingily almost.''

They are not bound by the overhead of a large riverfront shipyard; they pack up and move workers, equipment and computers to the job - whether it's in Hampton Roads, Baltimore or Florida.

Tecnico has also tried to diversify into other areas: federal services, management services and a new Advanced Materials Group. The Advanced Materials Group could eventually bring in a sizeable portion of the company's revenue, Torrech said.

Tecnico licensed a manufacturing process developed by NASA Langley to make composite materials. The company's work on that process caught the eye of Lockheed Martin Vought Systems.

Lockheed Martin is interested in seeing if the composite manufacturing process could help it develop a replacement for the Patriot missile.

``Our process is such that we can easily fashion angles and shapes that, through normal processes, are very expensive and difficult to do,'' Torrech said.

Lockheed, under a mentoring program, is teaching Tecnico how to manufacture parts for the missile. Torrech said the company has not perfected the process yet, but is on its way.

``This is becoming a success story in how the government labs are working with small business to take technology and give them a new business base,'' Torrech said. ILLUSTRATION: [Color Photo]

GARY C. KNAPP

Rafael Torrech III, a former executive at Norshipco, founded Tecnico

Corp. in 1991.

HEADQUARTERS: Chesapeake

OFFICES: Philadelphia, Washington, San Diego, Panama City, Fla.

LINES OF WORK: Ship repair, industrial work, composite material

fabrication.

WHEN ORGANIZED: 1991

EMPLOYEES: 280

CEO: Rafael Torrech III

THE CHAMBER SAYS: "Defense conversion success story. Trying to

commercialize outside defense industry."